Interlaken - Brienz - Mont Tramelan

9 July 2012 - Sunny 26 degrees, mountain area 16 degrees Celsius.

This morning we had a pick up arranged with Mathias Gerber, President of the Simmental Association.  10am we met Florian and Mathias at the Merkur Hotel in Interlaken.  The four of us travelled to Brienz where we met farmers Ueli and Karin Grossmann - Schlaeppi and their two children, then driving on to the mountainside nearby to see their cattle.  During the summer months the cattle are on the mountain slopes and when winter draws near the cattle are brought down to barns.  There is accommodation in the mountainside where Ueli's father stays during summer, where we had lunch that day.  

Mountain side accommodation

We walked around the mountainside looking at the cattle, 

Florian, Trevor and Ueli looking at Ueli's cattle.

plus we saw ibex 

Spot the ibex

and wildflowers abound, taking photos of the Alpine Rosa, one of only three wildflowers unique to Switzerland.  

Alpine Rosa

This area can be experienced on one of the many hikes around this area.  

Walking tracks near Brienz

After lunch we visited a waterfall near Brienz and had ice-creams, 

Giessbach Waterfall near Brienz

we said our goodbyes to the lovely Grossmann - Schlaeppi's (note they have an Alpine Restaurant at Bali ski and hiking area in the Meiringen - Hasliberg Haslital, www.balis.ch) and travelled north past Bern to Biel where we saw the largest cattle farm in Switzerland, which the land is rented from the government and has prisoners work on the farm.  The land here is surprisingly flat.  

Simmental Cattle in a barn near Biel

Travelling further north we arrived at Mont Tramelan, where we stayed the night in a holiday let.  We spent the evening exploring the outside of the house which shares a wall with the barn, so from one side the house looks like a barn only and the other side where the house is there is a lovely vegetable and fruit garden.  

House and barn in one building

Flower, fruit and vegetable garden

The landscape here is that of rolling hills and this area is known for being the place where Swiss timepieces are made.

The next day was sunny in the morning, temperatures in the low 20's followed by an afternoon hail storm.

This morning we had breakfast with Mathias and then had a look around his barn and saw his Simmental Cattle on his farm.  

Mathias's cattle

After admiring his cattle we drove to Florian's property and met his daughter.  Florian leases the land from a lady in her 90’s; the farm was named Florian  Wenger Chateau and of course has a Chateau.  

The chateau

All five of us went to have a look at Florian's cattle; I didn't get out of the 4WD as he has two large white dogs that live amongst the cattle herd to protect them from wolves and lynx.  

The cattle and dogs

After viewing the cattle we returned to the house for cordial made from local flowers plus some fruit.  Then Mathias drove us to his sister's place and we had lunch there with her husband and daughter.  They have a dairy plus sheep which were black and brown in colour.  

The black and brown sheep

It was a lovely lunch of braised meat, potatoes, tomato and salad.  Desert was vanilla and strawberry yoghurt with raspberry sauce and fresh raspberries.  After lunch Mathias took us to another farm which the land and buildings are leased from the government.  One of the buildings was built in 1825.  

The 1825 house

We went to one of the paddocks to look at the Simmental Cattle 

Simmental cattle and the storm before it hit the first time

and then decided to go for a drive to another paddock to see more cattle, when it started to rain and hail, so we returned to their house to have a hot drink and an apricot cake.  The storm had finished so we thought and so we drove to another paddock, where we got out of the van and were admiring the cattle when lightning started around us.  

Simmental Cattle hiding from the storm

Next thing we saw a bolt of lightning hit a tree in the forest about 500 metres from where we had been standing followed by the crash of thunder and direct hit on the tree.  We all ran back to the van and drove back to the house, hail starting once more.  That night we had a BBQ at Mathias's house with all the farmers except for the Grossmann-Schlaeppi attending.